


Gunshot

by writerforlife



Category: Six of Crows Series - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Some angst, but also a healthy dose of fluff I'm not a monster, character injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-12
Updated: 2017-02-12
Packaged: 2018-09-23 16:36:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9665774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writerforlife/pseuds/writerforlife
Summary: When Kaz Brekker showed up at your door at three in the morning, trying to hide that he was out of breath, wearing blood like a coat and a grim expression like diamond earrings, all outcomes become hopeless.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, I haven't posted in forever, but here something is!

When Kaz Brekker showed up at your door, nothing good was to come.

When Kaz Brekker showed up at your door at three in the morning trying to hide that he was out of breath, nothing good is to come.

When Kaz Brekker showed up at your door at three in the morning, trying to hide that he was out of breath, wearing blood like a coat and a grim expression like diamond earrings, all outcomes become hopeless. 

The clipped, controlled knocks came as Wylan dozed on the couch, a sheet of figures still in his hand. His first reaction had been,  _ Good, he’s home. He can let himself in _ . When the knocks came again, he thought,  _ He forgot his key _ . The third round of knocks brought darker thoughts, and sure enough, when he answered the door to see Kaz with blood on his gloves and coat, his throat went dry. 

“Where is he?”

“Slat, still breathing. Come with me.” Wylan couldn’t tell if the grave tone was normal or something worse. His mind was already calculating all the worst possible outcomes. 

“Don’t leave.” Wylan went back inside to get his coat and key, then joined Kaz. They set off into the streets of Ketterdam immediately. 

“Is he alive?” The question had been working its way from Wylan’s thoughts to his mouth, begging to be asked and forgotten at the same time. A burst of courage let it through.

“For now.”

Wylan let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “What happened?”

“A few well-placed stray bullets.” Kaz sounded angry, but he didn’t think it was because somebody got hurt. Probably because it meant some part of his scheme had failed. “Some caught him.”

“Define some.”

“Three.”

“Three.” Wylan felt his voice trail off. “He got shot three times.” A sudden surge of anger rushed through him, and he stopped. “Why did you ask him to come with you on this job? You have other shooters.”

“I do have other shooters, but I don’t have anyone who’s both a shooter and a Fabrikator.”

“What if someone had come to your doorstep in the middle of the night and said Inej had been shot three times?”

A flash of panic crossed his face before he schooled it into something more neutral. “It’s much more likely she would be stabbed with a sword, given her current occupation.”

“Fine, pretend you don’t care.” Wylan was too fed up, too worried, to busy picturing Jesper bleeding out on the streets while he couldn’t do a damn thing. He glanced at Kaz, really noticing the blood again. “I suppose that’s his.”

“He would have bled out otherwise,” he said coolly. “And then where would you be?” He neatly wiped his gloves on his pants and sniffed. 

“Thank you.”

“For what?”

Wylan only sighed and kept walking. They couldn’t reach the Slat soon enough. 

“The man who shot him is dead, by the way,” Kaz said when they were a street away.

“And how did that happen?”

“Unfortunate accident. He hit his head on the pavement.”

“Really?”

“Many times.”

Despite everything, Wylan’s heart clenched. “Thank you.”

“Stop saying that.” Kaz opened the door to the Slat. “He’s in his old room.”

 

Wylan ran upstairs to find Jesper lying on the bed, a random member of the Dregs feeding him soup. He inhaled deeply, then cleared his throat. “I’ll take it from here.”

Jesper tried to sit up, gray eyes wide, when he saw him, but he gently pushed him back down and scooped some soup into the spoon. 

“Wy,” Jesper murmured.

“Hush.” One shot in the thigh. Two in the right shoulder. A little lower, it would have been his heart. Then Kaz would have brought very different news. 

“I can explain.”

“You always seem to have an explanation.”

“You can’t be mad at me. I almost died.”

“Oh, I can most definitely be mad. How did you get shot?”

“You see, one of the men had a gun, and -”

“Stop.” Wylan set the bowl down and placed his head in his hands. “Just stop.” He could feel panic and anxiety clawing at his chest, trying to work their way out.

“Wylan.”

“You lied to me. You told me this wouldn’t be a dangerous job. What were you doing?” He laughed angrily. Jesper wouldn’t meet his gaze. “Please.”

“There were Grisha slavers.” Jesper grimaced, eyes bright. Wylan smoothed down the blankets and took his hand, rubbing his thumb over his palm. He could have lost this.

“Here?”

“I had caught their attention, so to say. I went to Kaz, and we went to take care of it. There were more of them than we had expected.”

“Let me see.” Wylan pushed back the blankets to see the gaping wounds, feel the heat radiating from his skin. A man had almost killed him. His Jesper. He ran his hands along his chest, fingers trembling slightly. What would he have done? But what would he have done if slavers had caught him?

Easy. Travel the world to get him back. Walk, sail, ride, anything. He wouldn’t have stopped until he was back in his arms. 

“What’s all that smoke?”

“Smoke?”

“Yeah, coming from your ears. Thinking too hard?”

“Shut up.”

Jesper laughed, but it turned into a violent cough. Wylan rubbed circles on his back. “It’s okay, it’s okay.”

“I hate being shot.”

“Well, I’d be concerned if you liked it.”

“I’d be more concerned if you didn’t get into bed with me.”

“Still a flirt.”

“They didn’t shoot my heart.”

Jesper was joking around, flirting, but his breathing was shallow, body still. That’s what three bullets would do to a person. Wylan slipped under the blankets and adjusted so that Jesper could rest against his chest. He sighed and rested his head against Wylan’s collarbone. It was a funny thing, how well his head fit in that spot. It was as if they had been made with the other in mind, their bodies waiting for each other. 

Thoughts like those were what drove Wylan to tears. 

“Hey,” Jesper murmured when teardrops fell against his cheek. “No crying allowed.”

“You could have died. Very easily.”

“There are quite a few times where I could have died.”

“It’s different.”

“Why?”

“Because we’re… us. We’re us.” He felt his cheeks flush. 

“We’re us?”  
“You know what I mean.”

“Merchling, if I could move I would have my way with you right now.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Mmm hmm.”

Wylan pressed his lips to Jesper’s. Every time they kissed, he was blown away by the sensation. He would never get bored kissing him, never imagine those lips belonging to someone else, always be thankful for what he had. 

“Those will scar,” he whispered.

“I’ll be rugged.”

“Will you? Or will just be a fool who got shot in a gunfight?”

“‘M a Fabrikator,” he slurred. “Fearsome Grisha warrior.”

“Are you, now? Will you get shot again? Nearly die on me?”

“Not dying. Too much to live for.”

“Such as?”

Usually, Jesper’s answer would be cunning, charming, and clever all at once, but three gunshot wounds and a lack of sleep had weakened his defenses. “You, merchling.” He planted a sloppy but heartfelt kiss on Wylan’s forehead before drifting off to sleep.

Wylan, however, stayed awake for awhile longer, just holding Jesper, delighting in the weight in his arms and against his chest. 

Tomorrow, he would wake up still holding him. There would be a pathway to recovery, but he would walk it ten times if it meant he could keep Jesper. 

Tomorrow and in the weeks to come, he would kiss Jesper’s wounds over and over until he believed the scars would be beautiful.

Tomorrow and forever, he would be thankful that bullets didn’t always kill. 


End file.
